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Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Sounds like Stralman out for Game 4;Powe recalls how Flyers rallied from 3-0 series deficit

The Rangers, who now must win four straight to advance past the Bruins in their Eastern Conference semifinal series, a deficit only three teams have overcome in NHL history, held an optional skate today at their training center.

D Anton Stralman, hurt on a heavy second-period check by Bruins LW Milan Lucic - Stralman played just one more shift before missing the third period - was not on the ice and, from the way coach John Tortorella spoke about it, seems doubtful to out for Thursday’s Game 4.

If he cannot play, Matt Gilroy or Roman Hamrlik, both were on the ice today and have been skating with the Rangers’ Connecticut (AHL) call-up practice squad, are the candidates to replace him. Of the two, Gilroy is probably the more likely to be inserted into the lineup. Regardless of who goes in, if Stralman is out, it means more minutes for, certainly, Ryan McDonagh and Dan Girardi and, no doubt, for Michael Del Zotto, Steve Eminger and John Moore.

Then again, Marc Staal also skated today and, just perhaps, he goes back in for Stralman. Staal has only played Game 3 against the Capitals since having his vision affected as he was struck by a puck on March 5.

“Losing Stralsy is a big blow to us,” Tortorella said. “He puts himself in a situation there where he’s playing in an area to try and make a play and gets hurt. And he’s done that really through the playoffs here. To a defense that’s lacking a little depth right now, it hurts us. Listen, we’re 0-3, there’s no sense of feeling pressure, the players that get to play tomorrow and play more minutes than maybe they’re used to, grab a hold of it and let it happen. Crap, if you lose you’re done. That’s what I’m hoping for and I believe we will get it from some of our guys.”

Also on the ice today were Ryane Clowe and Darroll Powe. For Clowe, it was the first time skating with teammates since he went off the ice woozily in Game 5 against the Capitals after playing just 1:55. Clowe played Games 4 and 5 against the Capitals after returning from a suspected concussion.

Chris Kreider, who got hit in the forehead by Tyler Seguin’s stick blade, did not skate. It’s unclear whether either Powe or Clowe - more likely Powe - would be available if Kreider can’t play.

Powe (and Arron Asham), of course, was a member of the 2010 Flyers, who made the playoffs on the final day, as we remember, beating the Rangers in a shootout in the season-finale at Philadelphia, then beat the Bruins in the conference semifinal after falling behind 3-0 in the series and 3-0 in Game 7. Powe spoke about his recollections of that series and the similarities he sees between those Flyers and these Rangers after practice. Read below for his comments…
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“Obviously it was a memorable series. What I remember is just going in everyday and focusing on the game at hand. You obviously can’t win four games tomorrow night so we’ve got to focus just on the task at hand, which is coming out strong on our first shift. We go shift-by-shift and just chip away. You’ve got to try to win every shift. That’s how you’re going to get back in the series.

“You have to go in with that belief for sure. I mean, you win that one game and things start to change. After that you worry about the next game and you realize as you keep going your confidence builds and grows and you see the other side kind of going the other way. We can’t do it without a big next game.”

Powe said the sense of accomplishment after beating the Bruins was immense.

“It was a pretty special feeling for sure. I mean, it builds a lot of character and we have a lot of character in this room so I know we’re going to come out hard tomorrow night, put our best effort out there and do the right things that are going to help us win that hockey game.”

Already, Powe has talked to some current Rangers about what is was like to come back from a 3-0 series deficit.

“I’ve had a few conversations. Obviously we didn’t fall down 3-0 until last night so it’s pretty new, but we’re a resilient hockey team in here, we believe in ourselves and like everyone says it’s just one game. we have to focus on tomorrow night.

“There are a lot of similarities, yeah, in terms of personnel and how the potential is on this team. It’s a good group of guys, a close group of guys, guys that are willing to work hard and do the little things to win hockey games.
It’s never a good feeling coming into the rink when you’re down 3-0, but you have to put those feelings aside and focus on the task at hand. It doesn’t do yourself any good by feeling sorry for yourself or looking back in the past at what could have been. From here on out it’s just look forward and focus on what we need to do to get back in it.
It’s probably human nature to look ahead and realize those things, but you just have to focus on your process and what you need to do and not look ahead at what results you need. It’s all about your next shifts, your next battle. It’s about those tiny little things and if you don’t even worry about where you have to go, just what you’re doing, it makes it a lot easier.

When you’re going to climb a mountain you’re not going to sit at the bottom and just look at the top and be like, ‘How am I going to do this?’ You’re going to look at the five or six feet above you and go at that first. You can’t just go at it and look ahead, you have to focus on what’s right in front of you or else you’ll never get to where you have to go.
I feel like the coaches try to preach the same thing that I’ve been saying. You have to focus on what’s ahead of you, you can’t look behind. This is where you have to leave it all on the ice.”

Posted by Andrew Gross on 05/22 at 07:05 PM

slats off-season to-do list, asap:

1. fire tortsy and the horse he rode in on.

2. call edmonton with offers of MDZ and DG for some young offensive players.

3. deal/buy out richards.

there will be no meltdown by this bruin team, nor will the rangers generate enough offensive power to win 2. they’ll win 1 at home for the garden faithful.

Posted by joeymole on 05/22 at 07:46 PM

slats off-season to-do list, asap:

fire himself and the draft people -scouts etc.

only then do we get some sort of turn around

Posted by JJ on 05/22 at 08:05 PM

correction:
3. keep richards for new coach, give him to trade deadline to work it out. if not, then deal him.

4. let clowe go.

jj, seriously i don’t think msg will fire slats. i think its his job till he retires and messier (or ?) steps in. really think slats feels he can get rangers back to a cup final soon. (he prob tells that to the msg brass every year.) he wants to go out on top.

Posted by joeymole on 05/22 at 08:41 PM

yep this tea mis awful. being in the playoffs is a mirage. going to the eastern conference finals last year did not happen.

all the good young players really do not exist…every legit player on the team is under 30 except for Henrik..

blow it up, they stink and never will compete in the playoffs….

Posted by stuart a on 05/22 at 08:43 PM

Why fire the horse Torts rode in on? Isn’t that a bit extreme? Maybe we should give the horse a shot as coach, although we would have to reconfigure the bench so he fits.

So JJ, we should fire this group of scouts? The same ones who drafted a lot of these Boston players ... and Stepan, Anisimov, Cherapanov (RIP), Hagelin, MDZ (yes, even him), Kreider, Miller, Fast, Thomas and McIlrath—- and yes, the last 5 are still somewhat unknown, although I think it’s clear Kreider and Miller will be playing in the NHL for a long time.

Posted by CJ on 05/22 at 09:17 PM

cj - its a figure of speech. kabeesh?

its the young players and nash that need to be rescued from the tortsy system.

per bob mckenzie: “Rick Nash has had good games in the playoffs but they aren’t a team that scores easily and often and there must be a diminishing return on having to play that style game after game.”

All you crying babies only show up when the Rangers are playing poorly. JJ wants to build through the draft! WTF do you think we have been doing for the past 10 years! Oh, I’m sorry…we didn’t finish last so we could get 10 #1 draft picks! joeymole wants to trade for young offensive players. So let me think: Cally, Step, Hags, Kreider, Brassard, Miller & Zucc…these guys are all over the hill? And our defense needs a total overhaul? And the answer is to start over with a new coach, new defense and a bunch of kids wizzing around the ice from a team that just fired their coach because he could not develop enough offense! HAHAHAHA!!!

You guys are smoking pot and inhaling or got too much crack in your system. I guess Ruff as head coach and Renney as assistant coach and Sullivan as the PP coach is your answer. Oh, how ‘bout Milbury for GM!!!

Posted by rangerbill94 on 05/22 at 09:38 PM

add staal and sauer to the defense 2 addtl drafed players and they have the BEST defense in hockey.

Nash .. nash is a nice soft player. terrible in his own zone and not in malkin, cindy, ovechkin, and others league. he is the most dynamiv player on a offensively challenged team..

think if staal was playing. think if kreider had developed faster. think if RIchards did not turn 65 overnite…

they are not that far off. do not resign CLowe or definitely do not for more then 2 years and big dollars…

the clowe move was a mistake but it happens

Posted by stuart a on 05/22 at 09:53 PM

Argh, Nash is not soft and pretty damn decent in the defensive zone—- that said, he’s not a bruising power forward type that is going to spend a lot of time along the boards pounding the crap out of guys, that would be a waste.

Rangerbill, wish I would have expressed it that way ... yeah, that sounds exactly like what they would want, except get rid of Sullivan and insert Oates as the PP coach.

Posted by CJ on 05/22 at 10:09 PM

disagree on Nash in the d zone but that is not a major issue. he is a very noce player but he can give more…

richards total regression kills. there #1 center is now there #4 center, etc.

boyle as a 4th line cneter is a good thing on the 3rd line, not so much.

all is good Darell Powe and his incredible skill may be back for the next game. I mean he brings so much to the game…

Posted by stuart a on 05/22 at 10:31 PM

Posted by CJ on 05/22 at 04:17 PM

sather error has had at least 12 yrs to do good drafts and most of those are still in the hype / hope phase. and again i see the sather supporter refers to a dead guy - you have no shame whatsoever. once again we’ll never know about him and its stupid and worse to bring him up.

Posted by rangerbill94 on 05/22 at 04:38 PM

i stand behind my statements to end the sather error and also fore torts. we need new blood who know how to draft

Posted by JJ on 05/22 at 10:56 PM

Nash is not decent on defensive zone, completely disagree. Lack of playoff experience and being the go-to guy habits are evident on the ice.

Also agree that not everything can be done solely through the draft. Even if the team blows up and starts up from scratch, the team is going to need veterans, preferably better than Powes, Halperns et al. More complementary mid-level talents than taxi squad players.

And let’s not make it seem like the sky is falling - this is a decent team. Not enough to win the Cup but good enough to advance through two rounds of playoffs. Bruins are contenders whereas the Rangers are not. The better team is winning, as simple as that.

I am not eager to see a coach like Renney give shoulder massages to his players on the bench and flame out without getting to the playoffs. I have no problem with old school disciplinarians who will hold the players’ feet to the fire.

My only concern is Brad Richards: is he the new Drury/Gomez/Redden? I pray to Jebus that such is not the case. Can’t have a fourth “I’ll do good one season and then flame out while counting my cash” scenario again.

Posted by Jay on 05/22 at 11:28 PM

richards is a amnesty guy.

no doubt about it.. adios.

save the money and save the spot…

they need help at center plain and simple. brasard, stepan, boyle and ? they need a another 2 type center at least

weiss from Florida is a FA give him a 1 year deal…

Posted by stuart a on 05/22 at 11:35 PM

Shameful? Grow up JJ. He was the offensive star type player pick you’re always going on about, despite the fact that we’re usually drafting middle of the pack. So, I can bring him up—- he was drafted, right? He’s part of the draft record, right? Come on Einstein, answer the last 2 questions.

I guess everybody missed the play Nash made in the defensive zone last night to thwart a sure fire golden Boston opportunity. No, he’s not a defensive stud, but he’s no lazy backchecker who just thinks offense either. He was +16 in 48 games this year, good for 2nd on the team ... he’s +2 in the playoffs. What more do you want from the guy? Oh, and while we’re talking Nash and goal scoring, anybody else notice that Neal has 1 goal for the Pens? You think if you were offered James Neal tomorrow, you wouldn’t take him?

It’s so easy to just sit at home and watch the game, criticizing every little thing from the comfort of your chair/sofa, whatever. This team is not half as bad as you all make them out to be, but of course they need to get better. Still, many here are all about what happened the last game or two—- examples, move Girardi and MDZ, someone said that ... now Boyle is back in play, when everybody after the Washington series said “hmmm, maybe we should keep him”. Now everybody is silent about Pyatt, but before the playoffs everybody wanted him OUT. Then of course if the rangers trade Boyle and he does pretty well as a 3rd line center for another team, we’ll hear what an idiot Sather is for letting him go or trading him. There’s no real consistency—- except for maybe buyout Brad Richards, trade MDZ for a bag of pucks and of course, fire Torts—- ‘cuz he’s mean to the players, can’t run a PP and is stuck back in the stone age. So which is it, are the players to blame on the PP? I mean you want to get rid of DZ and Richards, or is Torts to blame because the players are soooo good?

Which way does the wind blow? Aside from Bob, if we made the finals for the SC, everybody would STFU about Torts ... um, maybe not, maybe we need to win the SC so the vast majority of the fire Torts crowd would stay silent for the summer, until we lost the first 3 games out of 4 the following season.

PS: and don’t misconstrue what has been written to suggest that Torts isn’t fair game for scrutiny, because he shares in the blame (game).

young guys to look at are; kreider, miller, lindberg, fast, thomas, and hrvik, and others.

sgin weiss as 2nd or 3rd line center and that team is very good….

Posted by stuart a on 05/23 at 01:34 AM

Posted by Jay on 05/22 at 06:28 PM

re the guys you mentioned

redden terrible signing from day 1

gomez - after 2 yrs led to long term re
mcdonagh plus some other pieces like prust for a while

drury - 2 good yrs before his body gave out so 2 good yrs 2 bad yrs

richards - 1 good yr - team made eastern finals for 1st time since 97 and would not have made that without him. so 1 good yr and 1 bad yr before he hopefully gets amnestied this summer/spring

Posted by stuart a on 05/22 at 06:35 PM

no more ufas - time for home groan to sink or swim. and weisss is a train wreck re injuries

Posted by JJ on 05/23 at 02:08 AM

weiss would be a low cost low risk.

no more UFA’s with big price tags….

the big tickets almost never work out.

kessel is FA after next year. he is still young!!!!

Posted by stuart a on 05/23 at 02:14 AM

Posted by CJ on 05/22 at 06:52 PM

yes shameful. because the shill cj will go to extremes to try to defend sather and his drafting. and because of that you put me in position to critique a dead guy. the guy had plenty of questions on his game. bottom line we’ll never know. and i repeat cj you are shameful in your shilling

Posted by stuart a on 05/22 at 08:34 PM

you;re kidding right. i see you follow the cj method using IF. well bottom line we may very well never have the staal you think and i hope for.

and i’m very unimpressed with your list of forwards. seems like alot of hype and hope.
and weiss is certainly not the answer not with his injury history.

Posted by JJ on 05/23 at 02:15 AM

Posted by stuart a on 05/22 at 09:14 PM

i don;t think you understand the cap. there is no room for kessel or anybody big money. not this yr and not next. and that’s with amnesty for richards. bottom line our bad drafting has us in a bad spot of being a middling team

Posted by JJ on 05/23 at 02:17 AM

Who cares what position you’re put in JJ? Your choice, your call ... go ahead, critique a dead guy with a world of talent, anything to defend your horribly skewed and subjective judgment. There were no question marks, everybody KNOWS exactly why he dropped in the draft ... only the rangers had the guts and confidence to draft him. Burns, doesn’t it JJ?

Posted by CJ on 05/23 at 02:22 AM

Posted by CJ on 05/22 at 09:22 PM

wrong as usual. you’re on quite the streak shill

Posted by JJ on 05/23 at 02:27 AM

Good answer JJ ... dude, you’re slipping big time ... not one of your better posts there JJ.

I want you tell me us all why the Cheraponov pick was, without hindsight, a bad one ... or even a middling one. Come on brainiac, show us what you’re made of, or not made of ... I mean Jagr was really impressed, but I guess JJ who never saw the kid play knows better—- JJ, the armchair “monday morning” should be pro-scout. lol

Posted by CJ on 05/23 at 03:13 AM

Rick Nash = Stanley cup.
7.8 million per playoff goal!
Great signing!

Posted by fuck you on 05/23 at 03:19 AM

Posted by CJ on 05/22 at 10:13 PM

shill - word was he was defensively weak and somewhat frail

bottom line i don’t consider him a failure and even our resident shill cj should not consider him a success. only the shill cj would bring up a dead guy to defend his mentor glenie

About

ANDREW GROSS covers the New York Rangers for The Record and Herald News, having joined the North Jersey Media Group in November 2007. Gross also covered the Rangers and New York Jets, as well as St. John’s basketball and Army football, for Gannett Newspapers and The Journal News (N.Y.). He graduated from Syracuse University in 1989 with a degree in newspaper journalism.